Question what does the church believe about life after death does the church believe in purgatory?

A question:

what does the church believe about life after death? B, does the church believe in purgatory? ^[1]

The Answer:

 The church believes that after this we rest till the day of judgement. And the day of judgement our Lord will come and separate good from evil, good persons from evil persons. As it is written in the Gospel of Matthew, St. Matthew chapter 25 from verse 31 till the end.

We don’t believe that during this period people may go to the purgatory. Why?

The Catholics believe that people may pay for their sins, even the sins for which they receive absolution from the priests. Even for forgiven sins, even for forgiven sins. how?

 Because they think that every sin should have punishment. If a person cannot suffer punishment on earth during his lifetime, he may suffer this punishment and the purgatory before the day of punishment, the day of judgement.

 We don’t believe in purgatory?

I published for you a book having the title of “why we reject the purgatory”. As for simple words, in the purgatory only the spirit is punished. While the flesh, the body, who committed sins more than the spirit, is not punished.

It became dust and no punishment at all. No suffering. And also, why we suffer punishment while our Lord Jesus Christ paid for our sins on the cross. If our sins are forgiven on the cross and we receive this forgiveness through faith and baptism. And the life of repentance. Why then we pay once more for our sins in the purgatory? I think if you read this book, it will give you a wide idea about the purgatory and why it is refused and rejected by our church.

I think it is not yet translated to English language. But I have a summary of translating this book I sent it to you.

^{[1] A Question Answered by His Holiness Pope Shenouda in a Sermon Entitled “Be holy as I am holy – Youth Meeting” Dated: November 22, 2002}